Ian Michael Glynn: carried out groundbreaking research into the sodium pump

Ian Glynn, emeritus professor of physiology at the University of Cambridge, teacher of many medical students, who developed our understanding of the mechanism of the sodium pump, has died at the age of 94.

Born Ian Galinsky, in Hackney, London, he was the second of three children to Hyman “Hymie” and Lottie (née Fluxbaum), whose families had fled eastern Europe when they were small children and who changed the family name to Glynn, owing to 1930s anti-Semitism. Glynn grew up in a large family, with his siblings, Alan and Angela; with many aunts and uncles; and with Hackney Downs and a synagogue nearby.

He attended the excellent local elementary, Sigdon Road School, which helped him win a scholarship to the City of London School, where he resisted the headmaster’s attempts to steer him towards classics. In his memoir Glynn described why he decided to read medicine: “I think I must have been around 8 years old when I saw my youngest aunt sitting at the table dissecting a human brain (the rules about the disposal of body parts were of course more lax in those days). She was the second member of our family to ‘do medicine’—her younger brother having led the way—and there was a feeling in the family that medicine was the ideal career. ‘Well, get qualified first; then you can decide what you want to do!’ was almost standard family advice.”

Glynn’s headmaster advised him to apply to Pembroke College, Cambridge, “because one of the tutors at Pembroke had been at the City of London School.” Glynn’s mother mentioned this advice to her greengrocer, whose son, Cyril Domb, had gone to Pembroke and become a brilliant mathematician. When …